LV have long established themselves as one of the more forward thinking production teams in the game.
Eager for new challenges, to explore fresh ideas, the duo's output spans everything from grime-influenced spoken work monologues to South African kwaito styles.
Playing a special Maida Vale live session for Gilles Peterson earlier this year, LV performed alongside prodigal Armenian jazz pianist Tigran Hammasyan.
Striking up a creative relationship, recording sessions soon followed. Signing to Brownswood, an album is currently in the works – and Clash is able to bring you the first taste.
'Jump And Reach' has an ever-evolving sensibility – the tempo is up but percussion is forever shifting, a supple, jazz-tinged groove which also belies LV's roots in the UK underground.
Tigran Hammasyan lends something quite distinct, both in terms of melodic choices and approach. Moving adeptly between funky chording and rather more abrasive, percussive effects, it's an intriguing first statement.
Check it out now.
Clash also sat down with LV to ask the pair a few questions about the project – check out their answers below.
You first collaborated with Tigran for a Gilles Peterson session – how did this come about? Had you met before?
We were contacted by Giles' producer about doing a live session with Tigran. We've followed what Giles has been doing for a long time – we used to go down to his club night at Bar Rumba when we were at uni – so we jumped at the chance to get involved. The first time that we met Tigran in person was at that session in Maida Vale. We chatted over Skype a little before the session to work out what tracks we were going to perform and then a couple of days later we were in the recording studio.
Seemingly you'd always wanted to work with a jazz musician – why is this? Has jazz always been a part of your musical make up?
We're interested in collaborating with musicians from all traditions and backgrounds really. Having said that, jazz has been a genre that we've always listened to and admired. The level of instrumental mastery that jazz musicians posses makes it a pleasure to work with them.
You're bound to have had offers before, what is it that makes Tigran stand out as a collaborator?
Tigran's incredible at playing the piano. Incredible. And he's also a very easy person to work with who's open to experimenting so collaborating with him is really enjoyable. You want a collaborator to take what you're working on in a direction that you wouldn't have taken it in yourself and he certainly does that.
When was the decision to make the album taken? Was it an instinctual thing?
We spoke to Brownswood about making an album after the live session was aired. We wanted our next album to be more focused on instrumental tracks, having worked a lot with vocalists before. So we knew were writing material for an album from the start but we tried to let it come together quite naturally.
Whenever we had the opportunity to record interesting-sounding instruments, particularly pianos, we would record with whatever was available. Sometimes that would involve recording an old out-of-tune upright on a phone, sometimes it would involve grand pianos recorded on nice microphones. We always had in mind that we were collecting sounds for the album which helps to focus your efforts.
How free form were sessions? Was it quite structured with some improvisation, or was it mainly quite fluid?
The sessions where we were recording Tigran were focused on getting him to play over ideas we'd started in the studio. He improvised over the ideas and then we finished the tracks off back in the studio. In general our process involves a lot of improvisation – it's a case of laying down ideas first and then structuring the tracks second. On tracks where it's just the two of us involved it's still a collaborative process so we find it tends to work best to not impose too many restrictions or structure until there's enough material there to start editing bits out.
What can you tell us about the track we're premiering today?
'Jump And Reach' started off just as a beat. Tigran came up with a riff on the wurlitzer piano that we all liked so we recorded that riff on some other instruments – synths, plus a type of harpsichord – and layered it up. Then we structured the track so it would work well for the dj. It's really the only track on the album where we consciousluy tried to make it a track to play out. We hope you enjoy it!
Photo Credit: Laurent Fintoni
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LV are set to release their new album through Brownswood later this year.